MADISON – Republicans in key Wisconsin counties will hear from what would have been an unlikely visitor just a few years ago — former Democratic congresswoman and 2020 presidential candidate Tulsi Gabbard.

And she’s not ruling out becoming a member of the Republican Party, or serving in Republican former President Donald Trump’s administration if he wins the November election, according to interviews Thursday with the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and conservative radio host Joe Giganti on “The Regular Joe Show.”

Gabbard, who served as vice chair of the Democratic National Committee from 2013-2016 and left the party in 2022, spoke Thursday with Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce President Dale Kooyenga, a Republican former state lawmaker, for a lunch at the Milwaukee Athletic Club.

She’s scheduled to be in Brookfield Friday for a lunch with the Republican parties of Milwaukee County and Waukesha County, and in Windsor later that evening for a dinner with the Republican Party of Dane County.

“Obviously, Wisconsin is an incredibly important state in national politics, and one that has a very independent spirit, which I respect,” Gabbard told the Journal Sentinel.

Gabbard, who served as the representative for Hawaii’s 2nd Congressional District from 2013-2021, is promoting her book, “For Love of Country: Leave the Democrat Party Behind,” and speaking out against the current direction of the political party. She has also been floated as a potential running mate for Trump as he challenges Democratic President Joe Biden — whom she endorsed after ending her own 2020 bid.

Asked by the Journal Sentinel if she could see herself becoming a member of the Republican Party, particularly if asked to join the ticket with Trump, Gabbard said, “I never say never,” but pushed back against attaching any labels to her political identity.

“We need leaders, whether you’re a Democrat or Republican or independent, whatever the label political label that is attached to you, to put the interests of our country and the American people first and foremost,” she said.

In an interview on “The Regular Joe Show” the same day, host Giganti asked Gabbard if there was one thing she could do in a future Trump administration to serve the country in the best way possible.

“I think there are a few different ways I could serve — as Secretary of State, Secretary of Defense — there are a few different ways I believe I could best serve our country. Ultimately, we’ve got to save our country and win this election. I look forward to finding the best way that I can do that.”

The U.S. Army Reserve officer left her post at the DNC to endorse independent Sen. Bernie Sanders, of Vermont, for president in 2016. Sanders caucuses with Democrats in the Senate.

“The fundamental message really is that there are a lot of different partisan back-and-forth debates around different issues. It’s OK to agree to disagree on things. I think one of the things that I have found disheartening, in my experience in the national Democratic Party, at least, is how little dissent there is anymore and how what was once a big open tent party has now become a party of of toe the line,” Gabbard said, adding that she sees people in both parties turning inward and shutting out people with whom they disagree.

The “most fundamental common ground” all Americans should recognize, she said, is the U.S. Constitution and the rights it provides.

Wisconsin is one of just a handful of contested states that will decide the next presidential contest, and recent polls show Biden and Trump locked in a tight race in the battleground state where statewide races are often decided by just a few thousand votes.

Democrats dismissed Gabbard’s visit as an effort to sell books and back Trump.

“Since leaving Congress, Tulsi Gabbard has made clear where she stands: she’s endorsed extreme Republican candidates like Kari Lake, she’s drawn praise from MAGA true-believers like Steve Bannon, and now she’s in Wisconsin to hawk books at closed-door Republican fundraisers,” Democratic Party of Wisconsin spokesman Joe Oslund said in a statement. “It makes sense for Tulsi Gabbard to be on Trump’s list for VP — given the chance, she’d push all the same attacks on our freedom that Trump threatens every day.”Gabbard’s visit comes as Democrats are slated to gather in Milwaukee for the state party’s annual convention this weekend, and a little more than a month before the city hosts the Republican National Convention.

She said she believes there are more undecided voters up for grabs than people realize — “disenfranchised” members of the two major parties, along with “politically homeless” independents and Libertarians.

The message she hopes to deliver to those voters is that it’s “time for us to again come together around our fundamental freedoms and rights enshrined in the Constitution.”

“It is unconscionable to me, and I say this as a soldier of 20 years and a veteran who was deployed to multiple war zones around the world: Freedom is something unfortunately too many people take for granted here in this country,” Gabbard said. “If you are not happy with the choices that you have before you in this election, we have to come together as Americans to stop those who are directly undermining those fundamental freedoms.”

Jessie Opoien can be reached at jessie.opoien@jrn.com.

This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Ex-Democrat Tulsi Gabbard meets with Wisconsin GOP groups